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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27428377">not even one can distract me like you do</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/llien/pseuds/llien'>llien</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Kingdom Hearts (Video Games)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - The Princess and the Frog (2009) Fusion, Canon Compliant, Departure verse, Love Confessions, M/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-11-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-07 00:33:33</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,117</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27428377</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/llien/pseuds/llien</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>"You're really something," Riku said, and maybe it was because the sun was that hot, or maybe it was because Sora beamed up at him, taking Riku's words as the compliment they really were, but what he said next was entirely without his permission, "I love that about you."</p>
<p>Sora froze, staring right at him, and Riku realized a moment later what he said. </p>
<p><i>Oh, fuck,</i> he thought.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Riku/Sora (Kingdom Hearts)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>149</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>not even one can distract me like you do</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Written as a prompt request over on twitter, and it was just long enough to make its way here. Short and sweet!</p>
<p>Technically I wrote this based off my departure-verse (all the king's horses and all the king's men) under the pretext that they're on a mission together, but it's not strictly canon to that verse since the confession in that au goes very differently than it does here lol. </p>
<p>Title from Céline - Gallant<br/>Say what you want<br/>But I've seen a million faces<br/>And not even one can compete with watching you<br/>Say what you will<br/>But I've been a whole lotta places<br/>And not even one can distract me like you do</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>"But seriously," Sora said, a swing of his keyblade rending the heartless in front of him in half. His work boots, the clunky form his original shoes had taken here in New Orleans, splashed into a puddle that caught the hem of Riku's pants. "Time isn't the same!"</p>
<p>"But you don't have proof!" Riku said, his own more designer and less heartless-thwacking-friendly shoes caked in mud. Braveheart ripped through three more heartless, giving him a lead over Sora. He grunted with the exertion, back momentarily lining up against Sora's as the re-evaluated the leftovers. "You're not exactly reliable about it anyways."</p>
<p>"Hey!" Sora said indignantly, and then he was gone, laying out another five and dammit, now he was ahead! Riku scowled, sighted a few more, and both dropping the topic momentarily in favor of finishing up. This was their first mission with just the two of them since they'd begun living at the castle, and of course they'd spent the <em>entire </em>mission arguing about the flow of time across worlds.</p>
<p>Riku was adamant it was all the same but that sizes impacted perception and Sora never realized because he physically adapted to each world. Sora thought each and every single world ran on its own timeline independent of anything else and how could <em>Riku </em>ever tell if there was no singular sun to base it off.</p>
<p>They were at a stalemate in their argument (and in how many heartless they'd slayed), both too bullheaded in their own stance to bother with the truth, which was that the entire subject was way out of their academical range. </p>
<p>Panting and chest heaving under the thin cotton of his tank, Sora dismissed his keyblade to cross his arms. "I'm an expert!" He said haughtily, apropos of nothing fifteen minutes after they'd last spoke.</p>
<p><em>"An expert!"</em> Riku burst out laughing, wheezing. Sora somehow puffed up to twice his size indignation. "Sora you can't even count let alone tell time!"</p>
<p>"This and that are completely different things," Sora sniffed, turning on his heel with his nose in the air. He thumbed his suspenders, hooking them around his waist as he stomped off. Riku followed as he tried to catch his breath, still chuckling.</p>
<p>"Okay, fine," Riku said, matching Sora's space, hands on his waist as he leaned backwards. They were tromping from the swamp back to New Orleans for a break and to replenish supplies, a mutual agreement gone unsaid because Sora had left in that direction and Riku didn't need words to know what Sora meant. They'd head further into the swamp tomorrow, finish up, and probably head home from there. "Say you're impossibly right."</p>
<p>"Definitely possibly!"</p>
<p><em>"Impossibly," </em>Riku reiterated. The air was muggy and hot, but familiar in a way that didn't bother either of them, even though they were covered in a thin sheen of sweat and more bug bites than Riku cared to consider. "Do you know what that means? What a big deal that is?" It was why Riku was adamant they were all running on the same timeline, because considering the alternative was mind boggling.</p>
<p>"Uhhh," Sora drawled, then turned to look up at Riku with clueless blue eyes. "Nope?" He popped the <em>p, </em>and Riku groaned at how cute that was, even though he made it sound like it was in exasperation.</p>
<p>"Different timelines means different universes means an entire—" he lost the word for how expansive <em>everything </em>infinitely could be, just gestured with his arms wide and clipped Sora in the head. "A lot," he ended with, "just think of Castle Oblivion times three hundred."</p>
<p>"Oh," Sora said with sudden clarity, then furrowed his brow. "Maybe you're right then."</p>
<p>He chuckled, and for a horrible impulsive moment, he wanted to tuck his arm around Sora's shoulders. It felt right. It felt like what he was supposed to do, to drag Sora close despite how sweaty they were and how hot it was, but he faltered, and the lack of doing something hung in the air, stale and alarmingly obvious. He swallowed. "Well, who knows," he said, awkward. </p>
<p>Sora seemed oblivious. "The King probably does," he wondered, "maybe Tron. Xehanort, <em>definitely </em>did."</p>
<p>It shocked Riku how casually Sora said his name, and rudely to boot, dropping the title. His name went unsaid, avoided as much as possible, as just speaking it would bring him back to life and the war dragged out another ten, hundred years. But Sora made him sound like just another person, like an old man with too much time on his hands, the same way he said <em>Yen Sid, </em>and <em>Cid, </em>and <em>Merlin. </em></p>
<p>Something tight and hurt lifted in Riku's heart then, and it swelled with admiration and jealousy, too, but it was small and overwhelmed by pride. And he couldn't help dropping his hand heavily onto Sora's hair, ruffling it wildly until Sora sputtered and whined, looking up at him through his startlingly thick eyelashes. </p>
<p>"You're really something," Riku said, and maybe it was because the sun was that hot, or maybe it was because Sora beamed up at him, taking Riku's words as the compliment they really were, but what he said next was entirely without his permission, "I love that about you."</p>
<p>Sora froze, staring right at him, and Riku realized a moment later what he said. </p>
<p><em>Oh, fuck, </em>he thought, heart pounding, eyes wide, and even if he could take it back, snatch the words right out of the air and stuff them back into his mouth, there was no way to do it when he was already obviously horrified, physically reacting before he could mentally figure out a way to excuse that as something casual, something <em>friends </em>say, and Sora was reaching up to grab Riku's frozen hand still on his head, because he didn't feel the same and he was going to tell him so and—</p>
<p>Sora held his hand, squeezing it tight, and Riku's heart wanted to thump-thump-thump it's way right out of his chest.</p>
<p>"Really?" Sora asked, sounding so vulnerable, Riku couldn't bring himself to lie. Not if it meant hurting Sora. </p>
<p>Riku squeezed back, and nodded jerkily. And then, Sora smiled, and somehow even though Sora had smiled like that at him a million times before, it finally hit Riku what it meant, <em>how </em>Sora smiled at him, and all the anxiety vanished in an instant, replaced by disbelief and hope so big, it felt impossibly bigger than Riku himself.</p>
<p>"I love you, too!" Sora said, and he made it sound so simple, like it was the most obvious truth in the world that didn't even need saying, the sky was blue, the grass was green, <em>Sora loved Riku, and—</em></p>
<p>
  <em>Oh.</em>
</p>
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